Mobile Messaging Applications Research Articles

A Black-Box Privacy Analysis of Messaging Service Providers' Chat Message Processing

Online messaging has rapidly emerged as today's primary communication platform, extending from personal, to business and even to government channels. But can these services be trusted to maintain the privacy of your communication? This paper addresses this question by evaluating 105 different online messaging platforms. Utilizing “honey” messages and active HTTP(S) , WebSocket, and WebRTC traffic monitoring, along with continuous observation of honey token access, we determine which messaging services process user messages beyond mere transmission. We conduct a large-scale honey token-based study on 69 popular web and 36 mobile messaging applications. Our findings reveal that 34 % of messaging services show capabilities of server-side message analysis. Seven of these messengers evidently conduct an extended analysis of the messages, reusing the results hours to an observed maximum of a month after the chat concluded. This shows that one cannot automatically expect the same confidentiality when chatting via messengers compared to in-person communication.

I'm not upset–I get it: Effects of co-workers' stress cues on help-seekers' social diction and empathy in telecommuting

In both remote and physical work environments, it is commonplace for help-seeking messages to be rejected by other colleagues. This paper investigates how signifying co-workers’ stress status would influence the social diction and empathy of help-seekers in the context of rejection. 36 participants were recruited to perform help-seeking tasks with virtual co-workers via a professional mobile messaging application (Trillian). Their device was tailored with a vibrotactile mechanism (TacStatus), which could signify different emotional states of the co-workers: no-cue, relaxed, normal, and stressful. Independent sample Friedman nonparametric tests were conducted to analyze the social diction and empathy of the participants in their messages for help-seeking and responses to the co-workers’ rejection. This study revealed that stress cues have observable impacts on the social diction and empathy of help-seekers. Stressful and relaxed cues were found to evidently shape the social diction of help-seekers. When faced with a relaxed co-worker, the help-seeker felt disappointed and unaccepted after being rejected. By contrast, when confronted with a stressful cue, help-seekers tended to exhibit relatively more positive emotions after been rejected. This study attempts to reveal the mechanism through which stress cues influence professional messaging interactions and collaboration. The findings could provide implications for the design of socio-emotional cues in the context of messaging.

Helios.TALK: A decentralised messaging framework that preserves the privacy of users

Communication via digital means, such as mobile messaging applications (apps), plays an increasingly important role in everyday life. However, most messaging apps employ centralized computing principles that relinquish control of their users’ personal data to social network platform providers. Decentralization has been proposed as an alternative that provides trustworthiness and data confidentiality, but this comes at expense of fewer provided features and non-intuitive user experience. To address this issue, we hereby present two interconnected decentralized messaging tools, developed in the scope of the HELIOS platform, which can support new decentralized social networks. The first tool is a framework that supports the development of context-aware decentralized messaging apps in mobile Android devices by organically tying together many of the platform’s standalone decentralized operations. The second is a decentralized messaging app, called helios.TALK, that builds on the framework but accommodates additional design considerations from the perspective of end-users.

Factors influencing m-loyalty and customer reuse intention toward mobile instant messaging services

PurposeThis study aims to empirically examine the factors that affect mobile loyalty (m-loyalty) and its influence on customer reuse intention towards mobile instant messaging services. This study identified measurement items to assess the business users and individual users reuse intention towards mobile instant messaging services and test the relationship in the conceptual model. This study bridges a literature gap focusing on m-loyalty and its impact on customer reuse intention, which has not received attention previously.Design/methodology/approachTo evaluate the influence of the factors, this study identified and extracted the items from past literature to develop the survey instrument. This study surveyed 600 respondents including business users and individual users from the Delhi-National Capital Region of India and applied the structural equation modelling to test the conceptual model.FindingsThe results revealed that satisfaction and m-loyalty have a direct effect on the business users and individual users’ reuse intention of mobile instant messaging services. This study found that satisfaction, usability, perceived value, commitment, trust and m-loyalty influence on business users reuse intention. This study indicate that enjoyment has an insignificant relationship on m-loyalty for business users followed by usability and enjoyment has an insignificant relationship on m-loyalty for individual users. Further, female gender does not moderate the relationship between satisfaction and business users reuse intention. The cognitive absorption and the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) theories supported evaluating the association between the factors in the context of business and individual users reuse intention of mobile instant messaging service.Research limitations/implicationsThe empirical findings imply that all the factors except enjoyment have directly influenced the business users reuse intention of mobile instant messaging. The significant influence of usability factor on the business users reuse intention towards mobile instant messaging is the major variation between the validated models of business and individual samples. The results of influencing factors of m-loyalty and its impact on customer reuse intention are associated with cognitive absorption and the UTAUT theories.Practical implicationsFocus on these factors can be beneficial for the business users, managers, mobile instant messaging service providers and application developers to increase customer loyalty and reuse intention for the mobile instant messaging services. This research will facilitate mobile instant messaging service providers to keep their services market relevant and focus on user satisfaction in building applications for loyalty.Originality/valueThis research identified measurement items from earlier literature to identify, analyze and verify the relevance of these factors in m-loyalty and customer reuse intention of mobile instant messaging services and fill the gap in customer reuse intention of mobile instant messaging services literature.

The Effect of MWOM Through the WhatsApp Platform Toward Customers Purchase Intention

The rapid growth of technology has transformed conventional word of mouth (WOM) into Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM). E-WOM on mobile devices is known as Electronic Word of Mouth Mobile Messaging Application (MWOM), such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Line, and WeChat. Many researchers assess the eWOM, but there's very little research about the MWOM. In fact, it's a big opportunity to do MWOM marketing strategies, especially on WhatsApp, which is the most popular media chat application in Indonesia. However, the SYFO company has not yet been effective with its MWOM WhatsApp marketing. This study aims to study the case of the SYFO company by identifying the MWOM factor through WhatsApp toward customer purchase intention and giving recommendations to optimize the MWOM. The researchers assessed nine variables, and a total of 119 respondents were chosen. With quantitative methods, the data gained from a survey through a questionnaire. The collected data will then be analyzed using the PLS-SEM feature in SmartPLS 4.0. The results show that information usefulness can have an effect on information adoption. Then, information adoption can have an effect on purchase intention (mobile purchase intention, offline purchase intention, and social purchase intention). Unexpectedly, attitude toward information cannot have an effect on offline purchase intention. The SYFO company or another company with a similar background may use the results of the analysis of this research to gain insight and implement the findings within the company.

Cognitive, Social, and Teaching Presences among Postgraduate Students on the Mobile Instant Messaging Platform

This study examines the portrayal of cognitive, social, and teaching presence among postgraduate students using mobile instant messaging in a fully online learning environment. Understanding the portrayal of these presences can help researchers to gain insights into the specific dynamics of these presences and develop strategies to optimize the learning experience among postgraduate students. However, a lack of evidence on how cognitive, social, and teaching presence is portrayed in this platform makes it difficult to identify possible gaps where postgraduates may need more assistance. This study conducted a qualitative content analysis of 2074 messages from four groups on WhatsApp’s mobile instant messaging application. From the research, 68% of the messages demonstrated social presence, 25% teaching presence, and 7% indicated cognitive presence. The cognitive presence on WhatsApp was the least demonstrated, as students preferred rich mediums like video conferencing to engage in discussions that require higher-order thinking skills. Future research can consider analyzing how students show presences using multiple mediums and explore how cognitive, social, and teaching presences are dynamically interplayed in different mediums using a qualitative approach.

WhatsApp-propriate? Exploring "WhatsApp" as a Tool for Research Among Ghanaian Immigrants in the United States.

African immigrants remain underrepresented in research due to challenges in recruitment. Mobile instant messaging applications, such as WhatsApp, present novel, and cost-effective opportunities for conducting health research across geographic and temporal distances, potentially mitigating the challenges of maintaining contact and engagement in research with migrant populations. Moreover, WhatsApp has been found to be commonly used by African immigrant communities. However, little is known about the acceptability and use of WhatsApp as a tool for health research among African immigrants in the US. In this study, we examine the acceptability and feasibility of WhatsApp as a tool for research among Ghanaian immigrants- a subset of the African immigrant population group. We used WhatsApp to recruit 40 participants for a qualitative interview about their use of the mobile messaging application. Three distinct themes related to the acceptability and feasibility of WhatsApp emerged from the interviews: (1) preference for using WhatsApp as a medium of communication; (2) positive perception of WhatsApp; and (3) preference for using WhatsApp for research. The findings indicate that for African immigrants in the US, WhatsApp is a preferred method for recruiting and collecting data. It remains a promising strategy to utilize in future research involving this population.

Improving Junior High School students' vocabulary achievement by using WhatsApp

Mobile messaging applications are increasingly widespread among the new generation of students in Indonesia. They use michat, line, WhatsApp and the other messaging applications. This study aimed to improve students' vocabulary achievement by using WhatsApp of VII C students of SMPS Panca Setya Sintang in the academic year 2022/2023. In one cycle, the writer used classroom action research on 19 male and 11 female students. The writer sent vocabulary instructions electronically for two meetings. The multiple-choice test was conducted after each meeting. The results showed that 63,33 % of the students could improve their achievement in the second meeting. It means that the use of WhatsApp in teaching vocabulary can improve students' achievement. Referring to the writer's experience in conducting action research, the writer offers a suggestion. It is suggested that English teachers can use WhatsApp as an alternative application to improve students' vocabulary achievement.

Comparison of travel attitude study methods using online tools: The case of understanding public acceptance of autonomous vehicles

With the growing penetration of mobile phones, mobile apps and media platforms offer new ways to conduct travel-related research. The aim of this study is to compare two pairs of quantitative and qualitative research methods that leverage these tools: (1) an online survey versus a mobile chatbot interaction, and (2) an online focus group discussion over a live video conference versus a moderated discussion over a mobile messaging application. As a case study, we investigate the public acceptance of autonomous vehicles (AVs) for public transit in Singapore. 320 participants answered the same five research questions posed across the four methods, which were carried out over the first half of 2021. Across all methods, it was consistently found that there was cautious excitement about shared AVs in Singapore. Nevertheless, there were concerns about the safety of AV technology and uncertainty of how AVs will be implemented in practice. Compared to more conventional tools, the advantages of using mobile messaging apps to conduct travel-related studies are their low cost, scalability, and ease of analyzing resultant data. However, it was more challenging to recruit participants, mainly due to unfamiliarity, uncertainty of time requirements and a need to install the prerequisite mobile app. In chat groups, there was an observed lack of group interaction between participants. Overall, we found that while chatbots and chat groups hosted on mobile messaging apps were potential alternatives to surveys and focus groups to widen participation, there are still some inherent limitations to be overcome.

Implementation and evaluation of EMAES – A hybrid encryption algorithm for sharing multimedia files with more security and speed

In this era of smartphones, a huge amount of multimedia files like audio, video, images, animation, and plain text are shared. And with this comes the threat of data being stolen and misused. Most people don’t think about the security of data before uploading it to any platform. Most apps used on smartphones upload our data to their server. Not only this, but other third-party apps can also read that data while it is being transmitted. One solution to this problem is encrypting the data before sharing it and decrypting it back at the other end so that even if it is intercepted in between the transmission, it would be impossible to decrypt it. In this paper, a newly designed hybrid encryption algorithm EMAES that includes the efficiency of MAES (Modified Advanced Encryption Standard) and security of ECC (Elliptic Curve Cryptography) was implemented in MATLAB as well as in android studio 4.0. using a mobile messaging application. Also, it was tested for different speeds and security parameters. Further, it was compared with standard algorithms like the RC4, RC6 and Blowfish as well as with other hybrid algorithms like RC4+ECC, RC6+ECC and Blowfish+ECC. The EMAES was found 30% more efficient in terms of encryption and decryption time. The security of EMAES also showed improvement when compared with other hybrid algorithms for parameters like SSIM (structural similarity index measure), SNR (Signal to Noise Ratio), PSNR(Peak Signal to Noise Ratio), MSE (Mean Squared Error) and RMSE (Root Mean Squared Error). And finally, no significant improvement was found in the CPU and RAM usage.

Farewell to Big Data? Studying Misinformation in Mobile Messaging Applications

Farewell to Big Data? Studying Misinformation in Mobile Messaging Applications

WhatsApp Use in a Higher Education Learning Environment: Perspective of Students of a Malaysian Private University on Academic Performance and Team Effectiveness

The mobile instant messaging application, WhatsApp Messenger (WhatsApp), has become a popular form of communication among adolescents, especially university students, and it has increasingly been used as a tool in collaborative learning in higher education. The use of WhatsApp for education to facilitate ubiquitous learning has been practised worldwide due to its popularity and potential to support teaching and learning processes derived from the diffusion of mobile technology and empowered by the use of smartphones. This study investigates the impact of the use of WhatsApp in a higher education learning environment on students’ perceived academic performance and team effectiveness. A convergent parallel mixed-methods research design was adopted with data collected through a self-administered online survey and two focus group interviews with students of a private university in the Sunway City, Malaysia. The findings of this study present insights into the popularity of WhatsApp among university students and that students use it for social and educational purposes due to its perceived ease of use and usefulness in enhancing academic performance and team effectiveness. Although WhatsApp is recognised as a rich and powerful collaborative tool for students with a positive impact on academic performance, it has a limited impact on the cohesion and openness of team effectiveness.

The Use of Mobile Instant Messaging in English Language Teaching: The Case of South Korea

While learning management systems and video conferencing platforms have become a pivotal means for implementing emergency remote learning during the COVID-19 pandemic, the integration of mobile technologies into online teaching has been largely recommended in order to create an interactive educational environment. Focusing on the case of an English Language Program in South Korea, this study investigates the actual use of mobile instant messaging (MIM) applications as a learning aid in online language classrooms and how this was implemented in creating interactive language learning environments during the current outbreak. Based on a questionnaire survey collected from 979 students, it then compares students’ level of perceived satisfaction with their language learning and communication in online language classrooms between the group of students that used MIM during instruction and the group that did not. The discussion presented in this paper provides language educators, school administrators and policymakers at all levels with practical suggestions and ideas to consider, given that our daily communication has become highly dependent on and is increasingly mediated by mobile digital communication technologies and new media.

The Effect of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Mobile Messaging Application Among Millennials in Public Universities in Malaysia

Mobile messaging apps are currently a popular method in Malaysia for communicating while on the go, owing to its convenience, reliability, and contact-free feature of mobile application. Fueled by mobile internet and smartphone growth, mobile messaging apps have become a strong force in the mobile app sector, offering users an alternative to SMS-based texting paired with social media elements and enhanced features, such as group chats and photo sharing. The study was anchored using the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology 2 theory. A survey with 150 respondents and PLS analysis is used to determine the antecedents of mobile application continuance usage during the COVID-19 pandemic. The results revealed that there is an influence in the usage of mobile messaging apps among the younger generation in Malaysian public university students during the COVID-19 pandemic. The main implication shows that mobile application among young generations in public universities has become popular. The convenience usage of the internet has turned the world into a global village.

Reducing the Cost of Diabetes Care with Telemedicine, Smartphone, and Home Monitoring.

The effect of an increasing diabetes population has resulted in escalated costs and overburdened physicians. The increase in cost is not due to the disease per se, but because of its largely preventable complications. Patient-friendly technologies are proven to significantly reduce complications and thereby cost, but seldom practised. Telemedicine is increasingly being utilized in diabetology to improve access to health care, quality of care, and clinical/psychosocial outcomes in patients with diabetes (PWD). In PWD, patient-physician interactions are essential for improving health outcomes and preventing long-term complications. Smartphones are one of the basic modalities for telemedicine application. Mobile phone messaging applications, including text messaging and multimedia message service, could offer a convenient and cost-effective way to support desirable health behaviors. There are diabetes-related mobile apps mainly focusing on self-management of diabetes, lifestyle modification, and medication adherence motivation. With the widespread availability of high-speed Internet, remote monitoring has also become popular. Home monitoring of blood glucose and blood pressure, wearable devices, and continuous glucose monitoring also play a vital role in bringing down the long‑term vascular complications of diabetes and thereby reduce the overall cost and improve the quality of life of patients. There are hundreds of tech platforms for diabetes management, of which only a few with proven efficacy and safety are recommended by physicians.

Share and Multiply: Modeling Communication and Generated Traffic in Private WhatsApp Groups

Group-based communication is a highly popular communication paradigm, which is especially prominent in mobile instant messaging (MIM) applications, such as WhatsApp. Chat groups in MIM applications facilitate the sharing of various types of messages (e.g., text, voice, image, video) among a large number of participants. As each message has to be transmitted to every other member of the group, which multiplies the traffic, this has a massive impact on the underlying communication networks. However, most chat groups are private and network operators cannot obtain deep insights into MIM communication via network measurements due to end-to-end encryption. Thus, the generation of traffic is not well understood, given that it depends on sizes of communication groups, speed of communication, and exchanged message types. In this work, we provide a huge data set of 5,956 private WhatsApp chat histories, which contains over 76 million messages from more than 117,000 users. We describe and model the properties of chat groups and users, and the communication within these chat groups, which gives unprecedented insights into private MIM communication. In addition, we conduct exemplary measurements for the most popular message types, which empower the provided models to estimate the traffic over time in a chat group.

Rethinking Activity Awareness: The Design, Evaluation and Implication of Integrating Activity Awareness into Mobile Messaging

Nowadays, different types of context information are integrated into mobile messaging to increase expressiveness and awareness, including mobile device setting, location, activity, and heart rate. Due to low recognition accuracy, sometimes users cannot accurately infer others’ status through activity awareness. Recently, activity recognition technology has advanced. However, the user behaviors of activity awareness with improved technology have not been studied. In this study, we design ActAware, a mobile instant messaging application that integrates activity awareness based on improved activity recognition technology, i.e., improved recognition accuracy and the addition of activity transition notification. We conduct a field study to explore user behaviors and found that activity awareness allows users to speculate on the reasons for chat interruption, plan communication, speculate on whether the chat partner is departing/arriving, and deepen the understanding of living patterns. Compared with disclosing other types of context information, users have fewer privacy concerns about disclosing activity information in ActAware. Based on these findings, we provide design recommendations for mobile messaging to better support activity awareness.

Are You a Soft Target for Cyber Attack? Drivers of Susceptibility to Social Engineering-Based Cyber Attack (SECA): A Case Study of Mobile Messaging Application

A rise in working and studying from home, activities which depend on the Internet, and the exchange of data coupled with a lack of understanding about security for interacting in cyberspace have made cybersecurity one of the most pressing concerns today. One form, in particular, is a social engineering-based cyber attack. Unfortunately, not much research has been conducted on the susceptibility factors that cause this to happen. This study attempts to understand what factors make a person susceptible to cyber attacks that can be seen from three perspectives: habitual perspective, perception perspective, and social and motivation perspective. The objective of the research is to identify specific characteristics and drivers regarding the social engineering-based cyber attack (SECA) susceptibility of a consumer exposed to social media messaging applications. A quantitative survey was employed to test a total of 114 respondents in Indonesia who are categorized as active Internet users. The study found variables within two of the three perspectives that positively contributed to a consumer’s susceptibility to cyberattack. These factors will provide valuable insight into prevention and knowledge of related risks of cyberattacks based on social engineering in the future.

Cultural influence on using mobile instant messaging applications to develop and maintain friendships

Mobile instant messaging (MIM) applications have gained popularity in recent years. Their useful and effective features help users communicate more effectively. Communication technology adoption requires an understanding of cultural factors. In this study, there are four cultural dimensions evaluated: collectivism (COL), masculinity (MAS), power distance (PWR), and uncertainty avoidance (UA). These four cultural dimensions of a country were studied in order to understand their relation to two constructs of friendship development (FD) and relationship management (RM). Furthermore, this study examines the relationship between those two constructs and people’s intentions to continue utilizing MIM. Three hundred and twenty-one respondents from Taiwan participated in an online survey. The PLS-SEM method was used to perform the data analysis. In the study, a significant correlation was found between collectivism and friendship development and relationship management. However, masculinity does not have a significant impact on friendship development. A high power distance does not negatively affect relationship management. A high power distance has a significant positive effect on relationship management. An increase in uncertainty avoidance does not negatively affect friendship development. However, an increase in uncertainty avoidance has a significant positive effect on friendship development. MIM apps for friendship development and relationship maintenance are impacted by four cultural dimensions. These findings provide theoretical and practical implications for insight into these factors.

Android-Based Short Message Service Filtering using Long Short-Term Memory Classification Model

Short Message Service (SMS) is a technology for sending messages in text format between two mobile phones that support such a facility. Despite the emergence of many mobile text messaging applications, SMS still finds its use in communication among people and broadcasting messages by governments and mobile providers. SMS users often receive messages from parties, particularly for marketing and business purposes, advertisements, or elements of fraud. Many of those messages are irrelevant and fraudulent spam. This research aims at developing android-based applications that enable the filtering of SMS in Bahasa Indonesia. We investigate 1469 SMS text data and classify them into three categories: Normal, Fraudulent, and Advertisement. The classification or filtering method is the long short-term memory (LSTM) model from TensorFlow. The LSTM model is suitable because it has cell states in the architecture that are useful for storing previous information. The feature is applicable for use on sequential data such as SMS texts because every word in the texts constructs a sequential form to complete a sentence. The observation results show that the classification accuracy level is 95%. This model is then integrated into an Android-based mobile application to execute a real-time classification.